Cathy Sack's List: Studying children's Literature

• But conventional views took little account of the circumstances in which the  book was written and certainly did not embrace modern critical theory, such as  the work of the French social critic, Pierre Bordieu, who emphasised the idea of  social reproduction: the background a child brings with him or her to school  affects their relationship with the printed page.

   

  At a practical level, there was the question of the availability of  children's books. "There was a tradition in the children's literature world that  talked about this stuff as though it was universally available, universally read  – the great classics such as Treasure Island. They weren't," Rosen says with  feeling.

• But when you write, Rosen argues, you internalise an audience. A time-worn  phrase such as "once upon a time" actually belongs to an intertext –  criticism-speak for the sea of texts in which a particular text lives. That  raises very tricky questions about who controls the text and sets limits on it –  who is the arbiter of taste? Rosen is adamant that it should not be left to the  Daily Mail. He cites the case last year of Jacqueline Wilson, the well-known  children's writer and former Childrens' Laureate, who was forced to change  "twat" to "twit" in her book My Sister Jodie.

• His book, One True Bear, is being claimed as the first picture book of its kind  to include the "particular kind of drawing that boys do". Which he says parents  of boys "know all about".

• But he says children themselves make a clear distinction between such  imaginary violence and real conflict and adults exaggerate the susceptibility of  the young to be influenced.

   

  "When children watch Peter Pan we don't expect them to jump out of the  window. We underestimate their ability to filter," he said
• US-based psychologist Michael Thompson is the author of the best-selling book,  Raising Cain: Protecting the Emotional Life of Boys. It examines the  contradictory pressures on boys and to help parents understand their behaviour.

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